HTC, a leading maker of smartphones, denied on Tuesday that it has to make substantial payments for licensing of patents owned by Apple. While the chief executive of HTC did not reveal exact royalties the company has to pay to its rival, he called $6 - $8 per handset estimated by analysts “very wrong”.

"I think that these estimates are baseless and very, very wrong. It is an outrageous number, but I am not going to comment anything on a specific number. I believe we have a very, very happy settlement and a good ending," said Peter Chou, chief executive officer of HTC, at a product launch in Japan, reports Reuters news-agency. 

A financial analyst estimated earlier this month that Apple would get between $6 and $8 per HTC smartphone based on Google Android operating system sold in royalty fees.

Apple sued HTC back in early 2010. Back then it was largely believed that the former wanted to slowdown sales of HTC's Google Android-based devices. After this, Apple accused Samsung Electronics over infringement of its patents. It is generally believed that Apple is attacking Google Android platform in an attempt to sustain sales of highly-profitable iOS based devices like iPad (iPod touch) or iPhone.

HTC was originally accused of violation of ten Apple patents. An ITC judge ruled, in an initial determination, that HTC violated only two. Since Apple did not publicly specified the ten patents that HTC allegedly infringed, it is impossible to say which two of them were considered to be violated by the ITC judge. HTC disagreed that it had violated even the two and said it would continue to defend itself in court.

Tags: Apple, iOS, HTC, Android, Business, Motorola, Samsung